What exactly is a family man? Performing and precluding respectable fatherhood in Dominica

Abstract How does a father come to be regarded as a “family man” in the Caribbean? By tracking the stories and strivings of various Dominican men who seek recognition as dedicated fathers, this essay unfolds complex answers to this seemingly simple question. Here, the lauded ascription of “family man” is revealed less as a signifier of fatherly commitment and care than as an idiom through which masculine “respectability” is performed or denied. The paper unknots the idea of the “family man” from several ethnographic vantage points: through the moral reorientation of a felon‐turned‐loving‐father who strives for respectable recognition; observant participation with a men's group who advocate for “good fathering”; the biography of a retired police officer reflecting on parenting and being parented across shifting fatherhoods; and a youth advocate calling for more accessible masculine models. These ethnographic voices call for more expansive, historically grounded, and practice‐oriented visions of the Caribbean father and “family man” while nuancing regional concepts of respectability and building on anthropological conversations about the making of moral personhood.